SBS 2003 bare metal recovery to new hardware via Arcserve D2D

Summary: The process of migrating the system to new hardware is more complex than software sellers advertise. The last migration was about 2 weeks, but hopefully I have provided information to help with your migration.

(I really wish that I had such a resource available before I did my migration)

Background:

In this case, we have Microsoft Small Business Server 2003 running services such as Web Server, SQL Server, and Exchange Server 2003. It is running on a custom built dual Xeon Intel Motherboard in a 4U rack mount server. We needed to migrate to a HP DL360 G5 1U rack mount server.

Normally, a new (or same) OS would be installed on a new server, and then all the related services and their configuration settings. However, tweaking of configuration in a dozen or so applications can be very time consuming.

So, we researched into the feasibility of moving the system to a new server.

The two favorites were Acronis and CA Arcserve D2D. Our reseller convinced us that Arcserve had superior support and was a better path. The vendor's sales department had set the expection that the migration was going to be very easy.

Well, we found that the CA knowledge base/website was useless, and finding the tech support contact phone # for D2D was a challenge. So, yes, we did run into issues when trying to do the Bare Metal Recovery (BMR) on new hardware.

I have attempted to document how we did the full backup, preparation, restore, and reconfiguration.

I had configured the Arcserve D2D to use an external USB Drive as a backup device. In my case, I used a HP Personal Media Drive. It was automatically recognized by the old server, D2D BMR application, and the new server.

Preparation on new server:
. Apply all firmware updates.
. Verify that your new logical drive will be the same or larger than current volume.
. Download the support pack for your OS version and hardware.
. In my case, I did a system cmos erase/reset to factory.

Preparation on old server:
. Create a new folder specifically to contain all new drivers. ( C:\drivers )
. Extract all of the HP drivers for new server to the above folder.
. Document all network address settings. (like ip address, dns, etc) (you will need to enter this info on the new server)
. Do a good review of all apps that have IP address settings.

Backup of old server:
. Do a full backup to an external USB Drive, and shutdown the old server.

Restore of system to new server:
. The video covers the BMR process on the new hardware.

Network configuration on new server:
. You will need to configure your network cards with the ipaddress/etc documented from your old server.
. Verify all your apps that use network connections are not confused by the migration.
. You can boot your old server (disconnected from network) to compare the settings between the old and new server.

Clean Up work:
. If your old system devices are causing a warning message when you are configuring your new devices. (for example, setting the IP address for the new network card, yields a 'The IP address you have entered for this network adapter is already assigned' to the old nic).
This document enabled me to delete my old hardware devices. http://support.microsoft.com/kb/315539
. Since you moved to new hardware, the MAC Address is different. This may cause some problems with firewalls, that store your firewall settings by mac address/and not ip address.
. Move the D2D backup folder from your USB drive, to a more permanent location. (I temporarily placed it on a USB drive, since that was highly compatible between old and new server)
. Make sure that all your applications and system is working 100% before you do a new full backup.

A nice touch was that D2D Tech Support called me a few days after my successfull migration to check if I had any further problems. While talking, we came across an article that said that D2D did not backup Exchange 2003. Document ID: TEC537799.
https://support.ca.com/irj/portal/anonymous/kbtech?docid=537799&searchID=...
Luckily, in my case, everything seemed to have been backup and restored correctly.

I continue to use D2D to backup this server.

Sorry, but, I do not have the time to make this video better. Yes, I was half-asleep (1am) when I recorded the audio.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• arcserve
• d2d
• sbs2003
• migration
• hp
• dl360
• bmr
• bare
• metal
• restore

[darwincollins]

I believe I encountered that issue a few times and had to do several restores in order to get one that was bootable. I also replaced the CMOS battery, and went into the array configuration to make sure that the correct array/volume was marked as bootable.

[benjizmz]

I have a problem when trying to restore a windows 2003 when I finish doing all the steps and the machines do try to load stays at a black screen and blinking cursor is idle and does not load the operating system. and perform all the steps and no I'm doing wrong.